Working Class Hero
by lost frequencies
Summary: Walter Joseph Kovacs lives a routine life.


**Working Class Hero**

by lost frequencies.

**.**

**.**

Walter Joseph Kovacs lives a routine life.

He tolerates the fact that he has an honest job and follows the footsteps of _decent men who believe in a day's work for a day's pay_. He wakes up at four in the morning, walks two and a half miles to the garment district every weekday to start on a fourteen-hour shift.

At lunchtime, he joins his colleagues for a quick meal, never engaging in conversation, though a good listener to worthy acquaintances.

He spends the rest of the day slogging at the machines, on an unending pile of cloth, basting them into garments for women of all shapes and sizes. Calloused fingertips he's developed over the years are now impervious to needles and paper cuts. He works alone, among unsatisfied immigrant workers who never cease to complain about the ongoing war and low wages.

Once the initial process is done, the loosely stitched garments are then passed on to the three women in charge of adding the finishing touches. Two were middle-aged, while the other is young, soon to be married and eagerly waiting to leave her job. She is as quiet as he is, though she works mostly in fear—threatened by the possibility of sexual assault in a male-dominated environment of the female clothing workshop.

Kovacs has been in the business since 1956 when he left Charlton: a place he reluctantly called home since they took him away from his abusive mother at age ten. Now at twenty-two, he's come to believe he will spend the remainder of his life at the workshop stitching brassieres and lingerie. He denies any hint of unhappiness as he plans to speak with the contractor about his interest in becoming an apprentice. If he isn't going to have a future like how he imagines his father might have had, the least he could do is to move up the ladder to earn a little more.

Then again, life is all about compromise.

At the end of the day, while his colleagues look forward to getting drunk, Kovacs returns to the tenement apartment to convey his sorrows to God in silent prayer.

No one expected this "problematic child" to grow into a well-mannered and an intelligent young man. Eleven years ago, it seemed unlikely after he had viciously attacked two older children on the street. Witnesses and police officers were convinced he was beyond saving but he proved them all wrong. No longer was he the _whoreson_; the _diseased child_ of a prostitute. So long as God bestows mercy on him, Kovacs remains grateful to his invisible saviour for the trying and bearable times throughout.

And in some small way, beyond the deep emotional scars and bruised innocence, he had his mother to thank for that too.

**.**

**.**

He's never had a television in his apartment. His job isn't paying him enough to afford anything else except to pay rent and a month's worth of groceries. So he takes the usual trip to the newsstand for his daily dose of current affairs twice a day, before and after work.

Kovacs believes this is what his father wants of him.

_(To be a good American is to be aware of the social and political affairs of the country.)_

He's also hoping that his preoccupation with reading lengthy news articles on the Vietnam War and Dr. Manhattan's current involvement with the military would keep him from falling asleep.

He has a reason to forget about sleep tonight.

Especially since his subconscious dreams have been of a sexual nature lately; sexual nightmares similar to the one he had when he was thirteen. It reminds him of his mother, of poorly lit brothel rooms from where the sounds of beds creaking and men, grunting in carnal fervour, penetrated the thin walls of the narrow corridor he once walked along with bare feet.

He keeps dreaming about women clad in their underwear, reeking of cigarettes and stale bodily fluids, spreading their arms and exposing their bosoms to welcome him, to _love _him, like his mother never did. It never stops until he feels a release triggered by an involuntary arousal. Then he wakes up feeling horrible and ashamed of himself.

_(The past seems cruel to him even after he's decided to move on. No matter the amount of time and distance, __she __never wants to let him go. __Mother—__never lets him go.)_

So he buries his nose in books and newspapers. Like his father might have done before he died in the war.

A good man he was, Kovacs believes.

_(And good men aren't bothered by such nightmares.)_

**.**

**.**

The following morning, the contractor announces the arrival of Dr. Manhattan's _specialised_ fabric with moving symmetrical blots between two layers of natural latex. A young woman from Queens has the honour of being the first customer to order a dress made of said material.

As he learns to work on the new cloth, Kovacs grows intrigued by it. He does the usual stitching before passing it on to Shelley, the youngest of three women working in the workshop. She's been working as a Finisher for two years though it won't be long until she leaves for good.

Shelley examines the dress. "It looks awful. I don't think she'll like it."

"I think it's beautiful; looks like it's alive," says Kovacs. It's the first time he has ever spoken to Shelley, and the last he will see of her.

Shelley turns to look at him. Her dark brown eyes look tired, uncaring. "Then you wouldn't mind hanging this up for me, would you?"

"No Ma'am," he mumbles respectfully, before walking away with the living black and white dress folded over his right arm.

He still thinks it's the most beautiful thing he has ever seen.

**.**

**.**

In the early spring of 1964, the murder of twenty-eight-year-old Kitty Genovese becomes front-page news on the _New York Gazette_. Kovacs presumes she was the woman from Queens who ordered the dress two years ago. He remembers the angry complaints from his manager about her refusing to pay for the dress, thinking it was ugly. He couldn't understand why since he had always thought otherwise.

A steady decline in sales followed soon after, resulting in the monochrome fabric's short-lived appeal.

Short-lived.

Much like the woman herself.

Kovacs adopted Genovese's dress months after it was left forgotten in the storage room. He used to spend sleepless nights modifying simple tools to work on the fabric, mutilating the feminine form into generic pieces of cloth representing nothing but the ever-changing black and white patterns. He intended to create a wall montage of symmetrical inkblot patterns but had quickly lost interest.

Until now, her dress continues to wait in the dark.

Still forgotten.

Still useless.

Kovacs breathes in the cool late evening air, now walking towards the newsstand in Orchard Street to purchase a copy of the _Evening Journal_. After a hard day's work, his usual smart appearance has slackened off a bit. The first few buttons of his green plaid shirt have come undone, revealing a white singlet underneath. He pulls a flat cap low over his unkempt red hair to avoid any unnecessary eye contact as he reaches for the newspaper.

The scrawny middle-aged newsvendor then initiates a friendly chat as he gives the customer his change. "Long day, huh," he says.

Kovacs' clean-shaven, freckled face finally gazes up to look at the man. His eyes peer out from beneath the shadow of his cap, seeming cold and distant. "Same as any other day," he acknowledges expressionlessly. "Thanks for saving the last copy for me."

"My pleasure." The newsvendor nods with a tight-lipped smile. He watches as Kovacs makes a silent departure from the newsstand and disappears into the crowd.

**.**

**.**

The majority of his neighbours are large families with young children crammed into small apartments. As the only young bachelor living on the fourth floor, his seems fairly neat and simple except for the accumulated stacks of old newspapers in the closet and some dirty dishes in the sink. Closing the door behind him, he tosses his cap and newspapers on the dining table, peels off his shirt and plops onto the edge of the bed, feeling utterly exhausted.

Who wouldn't be after two days without sleep?

He lies back in bed, with one arm resting over his head, staring at the ceiling now, listening to the muffled cries of a heartbroken woman upstairs. He isn't sure what's going on but judging from her arguments, it's obvious her husband's been cheating on her. Outside, the dogs never stop barking. A drunken man sings his woes to the world before stumbling forth to puke on the sidewalk. Such is the chorus of the neighbourhood; the comfortable noise Kovacs comes home to every night after work.

His mind returns to Genovese. He wonders what his father would say, and what he _could_ do to prove himself that he isn't part of an apathetic society the papers have complained about.

Where were the vigilantes when she was in dire need of rescue? Why have they given up so easily? Has society become so desensitised to violence that it no longer knows what's right and wrong?

(_And why does one death matter against so many?)_

Good people are not apathetic; they won't stand and watch while a man rapes and murders a woman outside her apartment.

_(But there are so many deserving of retribution.)_

Good people are few in this world.

_(Retribution.)_

Maybe there _is_ something he could do after all...

**.**

**.**

_Rorschach's Journal. March 18th, 1964._

_The face is finished at last. Wonderful black and white, as all things should be. I am glad I decided to keep the dress these past two years. The face is perfect, a thing of true beauty; a face that can shelter me from the world and hide my weary senses. A face which I can finally stare down in the mirror._

_From this point on, I've decided to write down everything I see and experience which might possibly have a bearing upon my nocturnal mission. _

_This journal will be a complete record of my deeds which I can refer back to and a voucher to show the angels when they come looking for me on Judgment Day._

_I'll start tonight with the woman and her killers._

* * *

A/N: Journal entry taken from the Watchmen source book.


End file.
